Housing Kits Distributed to Social Land Concession Beneficiaries

7,380 sheets of zinc were distributed to 123 families in 13 Makara, Chamkar Russey, and O’kcheay Villages, Prek Preaksdach district, Battambang City, Battambang on 14 December by Habitat for Humanity and government partners.

With the housing kits the families are able to supplement their housing repair activities and complete the construction of new houses on their newly allocated legal land plots that they recently received along with the land certificates. “The zinc sheets support many families in my village to finish the construction and repair of their houses. This also builds-up their confidence towards the process of land tenure distribution with a demonstration of the positive movement of our project. It has been a long process, but we are happy about the delivery of tasks as we’ve seen today. I have strong faith in this project; it will surely be able to reach its goal of delivering secure land tenure to families like mine,” says Mr. Phon Pho the Community Leader in O’kcheay Village.

The project called Strengthening Civil Society Government Partnership to Deliver Secure Land Tenure began its work in Battambang in 2008 supported my Japan Social Development Fund through The World Bank. HFH Cambodia has made significant steps in leading the program by working closely with all levels of the government (national, provincial, municipal and commune) and strengthening awareness on Social Land Concession. The aim of this innovative project is to provide each existing family with a legal plot located about 2km South East of Battambang’s city center (the Garden Area). The World Bank funding has allowed the project to build three community Centers, 8 lines of road and drainage system along with some housing loans to support the water and electricity connection needs of the families at the end of the project.

So far, 99 concrete columns and 123 bamboo columns have been marked to define the boundary of the legal land plots on the Social Land Concession areas. As a result, 80% of the families have started building houses on the new legal land plot and the other 20% are in the process of completing their land filling and are getting ready for their own housing projects. The construction of new road and drainage system will start early 2013.

The housing kit distribution was attended by H.E Uy Ry, the Deputy Governor of Battambang Province, representatives from The World Bank, local authorities, local and international partner organizations and other community members in the villages. Each housing kit contained 60 zinc sheets.